Miscellany, with mink

American mink - I saw one in the wild at Shaker Lakes last week!

I'm plagued with the sense that the summer is passing me by, which morphs into one big existential cliche that bores me too much to elaborate. Regular readers will notice that I have not been blogging at all, which could contribute to this syndrome -- not catching the quick silvery moments, and so on. This is not for lack of thinking about what I would write if I were writing here, but thinking is not writing. Rather than reconstruct weeks worth of observations and interesting bits, let me tell you about the nowish things, a few of them.

I dropped Z at a friend's house this morning and stopped for a bit to chat in the kitchen, which always amazes me with its beautiful, oddball Americana decor, complete with vintage signs and green milk glass (maybe jadeite?) tea cups. Today I noticed a collection of vintage orange juicers, each with its own unique juice glass underneath. I love this. I will try to divert myself from the wish that I could maintain a house like that by expressing my delight that someone else does.

Yesterday, I went to a wedding reception in my third barn of the season. (Barn #2 was also this weekend, at girls camp.) The weather was perfect. I wore a strappy sundress to soak up the balmy evening breezes and to show off the effects on my shoulders and biceps of my almost daily workouts since school let out. (Not Michelle O. arms yet, but I'm feeling good about them.) I found myself wishing for more opportunities for people to have grand parties besides weddings and bar mitzvahs. Like, let's just have events! Everywhere! With food! And wine! And dress-ups!

Over the weekend, Z and I walked through the dark woods with the other girls camp-ers to howl at the cloudy sky, glowing white from the moon concealed somewhere within. In the woods and over the meadow the fireflies looked enormous, their lights like glowing, fat bumblebees. Z held my hand the whole time, and we helped each other cross the muddy bits. She held my hand lightly and firmly the whole time, my 11-year-old girl.

Reading: The time has come to ask yourself why I never allow myself to realize my fantasy of holing up at a hotel with a pile of books.

The book of the moment is American Gods by Neil Gaiman. I have a weird relationship with this book, on which more later.

Writing: Not really since I read at the pie event a week ago. Why not? I can't say. See paragraph 1, but don't get stuck there.

Dinner: At my suggestion, David made a skillet full of broccoli and leftover baked potato with onions and garlic and cheese, and big bowl of kale chips. And it was good.

This weekend, in the not shiny department, it seems as though Z had an allergic reaction to soy. Investigations are afoot.

Soundtrack: David Bowie, Sidney Bechet, and Sinead O'Connor - oh, and Weird Al's "Word Crimes." Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Random thing: In addition to a mink, I have recently seen a bunny small enough to fit in my hand, a hunting heron that ate something I could hear crunching 30 feet away, a bat, a suspected owl in flight, an irritated hawk over the rec center parking lot pursued by a much smaller bird, several goslings, and I forget what else.